Quick Follow Me
by notesofwimsey
Summary: In the wake of Rikki Sandoval’s devastating actions, Lindsay Monroe faces the most difficult decision of her life. And she has to do it on her own. Rated M with strong warning for content. Contains spoilers for "All in the Family" and S.4
1. Chapter 1

_Spoilers for "Child's Play" and "All in the Family". _

_Disclaimer: All characters belong to CBS and their creators at CSI:NY._

_A/N: This story deals with very difficult issues, and is aimed at a mature audience. _

_**Summary:**__In the wake of Rikki Sandoval's devastating actions, Lindsay Monroe faces the most difficult decision of her life. And she has to face it on her own._

* * *

**Quick Follow Me**

_Come mama, come, quick follow me_

_And step on the leaves of the waterlily._

_Henry Lawson_

Chapter 1

"Hey, Linds. Are you okay?" Stella's green eyes were filled with sympathy as the younger woman bolted into the women's washroom to stand heaving over the sink. After a few seconds of deep breathing, Lindsay ran cold water and splashed it over her face, looking at Stella in the mirror.

"Yeah. Yeah, I'm okay. Maybe I should have taken your advice and stopped eating food from street vendors." She flashed a pale grin at her supervisor.

Stella smiled back teasingly, "Or you should have listened to Mac and stayed away from Danny when he had the 'flu!"

Lindsay laughed and went into a stall, where she closed her eyes guiltily, waiting until she heard Stella leave.

One little lie. How many ways was that going to come back and bite her on the ass?

She couldn't have done anything else, she argued with herself. He was her friend, her partner, aside from anything else, and that was what partners did for each other. If she hadn't stepped in, Danny would have been reprimanded, and if even half of what Flack had told her about their day chasing after Rikki and Ollie was true (and she was very well aware he had not told her all of it), Danny had been within a breath of throwing away his career.

And her along with it.

Lindsay turned and threw up into the toilet. Nothing came out but a thin yellow bile. She hadn't been able to keep more than a few mouthfuls down for two days now.

Stella had noticed – had ended up sending her home the day before, where Lindsay had curled up under her warm duvet and watched soap operas until she had fallen into a restless and frustrating dream-state it was hard to call sleep: walking the streets of New York for hours, circling the downtown core, searching for something that stayed tantalizingly out of reach.

Didn't take an analyst to figure that one out.

When she wasn't wandering through the city maze, she was trying to find a room in which she had to take a test. She couldn't find the room, she didn't know what the test was for, but she knew failing it would be disastrous.

Again, not really hard to recognize the under-lying worry in that one either. Somehow, though, knowing what the problem was didn't make the problem any easier to solve, and knowing why she was stressed and anxious didn't take the anxiety away.

Mac had asked her that morning if she wanted to go back home. She had refused politely, and he had ordered her, after a sharp look, to stay in the lab. Hawkes had brought her a cup of tea with sugar but no milk and written her a script for anti-nausea pills, "If this doesn't go away, Lindsay, you need to go get checked out."

She had thanked him, sipped at the hot tea, and dropped the pills into her bag.

Flack had checked on her twice that day already, once to tell her Danny had crashed at his place the night before, but was on his way in, and once to see if she had any results from residue found at a crime scene. Both times he had asked her if she was feeling all right. Both times she had lied; the second time she used the street vendor excuse and felt badly when Flack turned green and tossed his half-full coffee cup in the garbage.

Lindsay washed her face again and went back to the lab. As long as she was dealing with grit and chemicals, she would be fine. Anything 'gooshy' she would turn over to one of the techs.

Her shift was nearly over before she caught more than a glimpse of Danny. He had passed the lab a few times, but always at a run, head down, reading a file or arguing with Adam. She had stopped hoping he would come and see her, had stopped looking up every time someone paused by the door. She was tidying up her station and logging all the evidence back in when she was interrupted by the clearing of a throat.

"Montana."

She tried, but could not keep the shiver from passing through her body. How was it possible, she wondered crossly, that one word, drawled in that husky accent, could control her like that?

"Hi, Danny." She refused to turn around, refused to let him see her face. He would know instantly that something was wrong, and wouldn't let it go until she told him. And she couldn't tell him.

_"Or worse," a vicious little voice deep inside her churning gut whispered, "Worse. He won't notice a thing. Because he doesn't see you at all. Hasn't for days."_

Lindsay closed her eyes, desperate to keep her stomach under control.

"Your shift over?" His voice sounded almost normal, just tired.

She moved away from him, taking off her lab coat and reaching for her jacket. She stilled when his hands gently covered hers, helping her put it on.

"Like the well-brought up boy he is," she thought, her pleasure oddly tinged with bitterness.

"I'm off too - shortened shift. Want to go get something to eat?" It was said so casually that Lindsay shot him a suspicious look, wondering who had been talking to him, which oh-so-helpful friend had pushed him in here. But when she turned to look at him, there was no hint that his offer was anything but genuine. And although he looked tired, he did not look like "crashing at Flack's" had been a euphemism for "going on a bender and having to sleep on a floor."

He put out a hand, "Come on, Linds. Come and eat with me. You look like you haven't eaten in days."

"I'm not very hungry, Danny. I think I'll just go home, if you don't mind." She dropped her gaze; she couldn't look him in the eye.

His hand stayed where it was, half-stretched out in ... entreaty? Apology? She couldn't tell, and she couldn't let it make a difference.

"You okay?"

"Yeah. My stomach is just a bit upset - maybe that flu that was going 'round this week." She knew from the slight wince that he had taken that as a slam.

Perhaps she had meant him to.

"Let me take you home." His hand finally dropped to his side, where it hung, clenched in a whitening fist.

She looked him in the eyes and spoke as firmly as possible while her stomach rolled over in slow waves, "It's okay, Danny. You don't have to. I'm just going to go home and sleep for about 24 hours straight anyway. You look beat. You should go home too."

His shoulders slumped, and he unconsciously rubbed his left hand with his right as if massaging pain out of it. "How are you getting home?" It was a concession of sorts.

"I'll take a cab. I promise." She tried to smile at him, but could feel the failure slip on her lips.

"Lindsay..." His voice failed.

She reached out and squeezed his arm briefly, "It's okay, Danny. Call me tomorrow, okay? Before my shift? I'm on at noon."

He nodded, and she left the room as quickly as she could without running, feeling his eyes on her long after she had left the building and was on the street.

She could still feel his eyes on her when she sat on a bench hours later, huddled in her coat, staring across the street at a Women's Health clinic, open 24 hours for the busy and the desperate.

She was trying to figure out which she was.

She wasn't stupid. She knew what excessive tiredness, nausea, tenderness in the breasts, and missing her period the week before spelled. She knew that even taking precautions, people got pregnant. And Danny and she had not been particularly careful; after all, they had been together for several months, since last spring. They had been circling the idea of moving in together - nothing definite, no plans set, but every so often one would make a comment and the other would cap it and then the discussion would be laid to rest.

If they sometimes forgot the condom... If she sometimes didn't use her diaphragm... If they were not always as careful as they could have been...

It wasn't supposed to matter. They were a couple. They should have been able to deal with things together, like two rational adults: discuss options, talk about plans, make decisions. Something like this should have been theirs to work out.

But then Ruben had been shot. And Danny, who had seemed okay at first, had drifted further and further away. He had shown up at her apartment, had stood beside her at work, had talked to her as if nothing was happening, and all the time, she watched, helplessly, as the wall was being erected, brick by brick, between them.

If Ruben hadn't been shot, she had planned to tell him. As soon as her period hadn't shown up on schedule. If she was pregnant - and she knew it was only a remote possibility - but if she was, he was the father. He had every right to know about it, to be part of the discussion she had been having over and over and over again in her own head. This was not the kind of thing she could have ever imagined keeping from him for even a moment.

But Ruben had been shot. And when Danny realized that Rikki, Ruben's mother, had come to his apartment to steal his gun, to go after the man she blamed for her son's death, he had not hesitated. He had gone to find her, to make things right, to fix what could never be repaired.

He had not once, not for one minute, thought of phoning Lindsay. Or of calling Flack. Had not asked for help or for back-up or even for support. Even after he had brought Rikki in to face the consequences of her grief-driven actions, he had not called Lindsay, had not spoken to her until the next day, when he had contented himself with thanking her for covering for him, and then told her off for asking Flack to look out for him.

Lindsay sank deeper into her warm coat, pushing her hands further into the pockets and spreading her fingers over her belly. She hardly blinked, staring at the clinic's sign as if it held the answers to life's mysteries.

She understood guilt. None better. She had spent years dealing with it. Survivor's guilt. The idea that you somehow owed the people who died in your place. As if it had been your choice.

And she knew that for Danny, the guilt was as real as that little boy had been. Ruben had been one of the close-guarded secrets of his life, a pure joy untouched by the ugliness of the job he faced every day. Lindsay had not even known how close they were until after the child's death.

A death Danny blamed himself for. Reluctantly, Flack had relayed what Danny had said to the child's mother as he had inched himself in between the gun held in her shaking hand and the man she was threatening, a man who did not even understand, or care, why she was trying to kill him.

"If I would have stayed with Ruben and made sure he got home, he'd be alive. That's all I had to do. So if you want to shoot someone…"

Tears streamed down Lindsay's cheeks, but she didn't move. She could hear her Danny saying it. But worse, she could feel him believing it.

And how was she to go to him, to this man who lost everything he loved to the job - friends and family - and tell him she could replace that child? That she could give him a child of his own blood, of his own making. As if one child could take the place of another. As if offering him a baby could somehow compensate for the loss of a bright, loving little boy.

Maybe one day. Please God. Maybe one day she could tell him they were going to be parents and see nothing but unclouded joy in his eyes.

But that day was not this day.

Lindsay took in a deep breath and held it until her sight went dark. Then she pushed herself wearily off the bench, and walked across the street. She hesitated once more as her hand reached out for the clinic door. Then she straightened her shoulders, and pushed through them.


	2. Chapter 2

_Spoilers for "Child's Play" and "All in the Family". _

_Disclaimer: All characters belong to CBS and their creators at CSI:NY._

_A/N: Thank you so much to all those reading and reviewing this story – I do appreciate the comments and all the interest. Barring horrible weather complications, the story will be updated every day._

_The lyrics at the beginning of each chapter are from a poem by Henry Lawson, an Australian poet. I learned the poem as a song performed by Priscilla Herdman on her first album, The Water Lily._

* * *

Chapter 2

_A lonely young wife in her dreaming discerns_

_A lily-decked pool with a border of ferns_

_Henry Lawson_

"Danny, I'm looking for Lindsay. Any ideas?"

Danny looked up, startled, into the stern eyes of his boss. Sometimes it was easy to think of Mac as a friend, but other times, like now, there was no doubt about his role.

"I haven't seen her, boss. But she wasn't looking good yesterday. She said she was going home to sleep round the clock." He glanced at his watch with a worried look. Lindsay should have come in for the noon shift, nearly an hour ago. He had phoned her at 9:00 and had felt a rush of guilty relief when her phone had gone instantly to voice mail.

"_Hey, Linds. I guess you're still sleeping. Hope you're feeling better. Let me know if you want me to call you in sick, okay?" _

Mac sighed impatiently. "Damn it. Danny, these games are getting a bit juvenile, don't you think?" He left him no room to answer before saying, "I don't have a problem with relationships on the team, but covering for each other has to have some legitimate purpose. If you two can't handle things more professionally, I'll be forced to change things around. I expect you to find her and tell her I want to see her, please."

Stunned into silence, Danny said nothing, just nodded his head as Mac stalked away. He flipped open his phone and hit speed dial as he walked through the hallways quickly. "Hey, Montana. You okay? Mac's on the warpath. Call me."

He ran into Stella in the locker-room when he went to grab his coat.

"Where are you going, Danny? I need you to process those fingerprints from the scene Hawkes caught this morning."

"Sorry, Stella. Mac's looking for Lindsay, and she's not answering her phone. I thought I'd go and make sure she's all right." He would have tried avoiding her searching stare, but there really was no point, so he looked her full in the face, trying to impress her with his honesty before running away.

Stella frowned. "She was sick yesterday, throwing up in the bathroom. She told me it was something she ate. Didn't you take her home last night?"

He had nearly made it to the door, but that comment spun him around, eyes wide. "No." He said it slowly. "She told me she was going home to sleep it off. She told me it might be 'flu."

Stella nodded, "Well, you had it earlier. It would make sense if she caught it from you."

Danny tensed. "Actually, Stel… I didn't have the 'flu."

"Oh?"

"I had … a problem… that had to be dealt with." He looked at his feet, nervously shifting his weight, arms folded across his chest protectively.

"Anything to do with Rikki Sandoval?" Her voice was suspiciously casual.

"Flack told you." His fists clenched tight.

"I heard from the desk sergeant." Stella said, then stopped and looked at him reproachfully. "Oh, Danny. Tell me you didn't drag Flack into this mess too?"

The undercurrent of disappointment he had steeled himself to hear was becoming a rip-tide.

"I didn't ask him to stick his nose in it," he snapped irritably.

"No. Of course not. You expected him to just be able to walk away from you." Stella sat down heavily. "Danny …"

He looked up then, and struck hard and fast, "It was my problem to deal with, Stella. No one else's. I was trying to stop it from becoming anyone else's problem."

She ran her hands through her hair. "Every time I think you've learned something about trust, about this team, you prove me wrong. When are you going to figure it out? Everything you do affects us all."

He opened his mouth to argue, to point out all the times his lack of trust had been justified, but the look of distress on her face stopped him cold.

"Go. Find Lindsay. Make sure she's okay. She's been sick for a week, not eating, throwing up. Maybe you can figure out what's wrong with her."

He couldn't think of anything to say, so he closed his mouth and moved.   He hit the stairs running, keys to one of the team's cars in his hand. Even in mid-day traffic, driving to Manhattan would be faster than the subway.

Every red light, every traffic snarl, every horn honking set his teeth on edge. He should have been looking out for her, he berated himself. He should have told her what was going on with him, not just frozen her out. He should have opened his eyes, seen what he was doing to her, instead of just wrapping himself up in a blanket of grief and guilt.

She'd been sick, and he'd been so self-absorbed he hadn't noticed. Stella said she'd been throwing up – not eating. He'd have been willing to think it could have just been 'flu… happy to think it was just 'flu.

But he, of all people, knew better.

By the time he made it to her apartment building, he was breathing as if he had run every mile from the lab.

Cursing the fact that they had not yet exchanged keys, even after all the months they had been together, he knocked on the super's door and flashed his badge. "I need access to Ms Monroe's apartment."

"She in some kind of trouble? She's a cop, ain't she?" The super, a man in his late 60s, shuffled and talked and sorted through a pile of keys on a long chain attached to his belt loops, his worn slippers scraping across carpet. "She's a nice girl. I can't imagine what kind of trouble she would get into. Nice girl. And a cop too, ain't she? She wouldn't do nothing wrong. No sir, not her. Sweet little thing. Came out here from Big Sky country, she always says. 'I miss the sky, Mr. Dillinger,' she'll say. 'Too many buildings to see the stars.' Heh. I tell her, you come to the city to see the stars, you get yourself down to Broadway, little girl."

He was pulling himself up the stairs one at a time, taking a minute to breath at each landing. Danny was twitching beside him.

"Brings me back buffalo jerky when she goes home. Ain't that a thing now? Makes me think of my granddaughter. Smart as a whip that one…"

Danny bounced nervously on the balls of his feet, restraining himself with difficulty from ripping the keys out of the garrulous old man's hand and just opening her door himself.

"You should knock first. It can't be right, us just barging in. You should really knock first… Miss Monroe? Miss Monroe? It's Frank. Frank Dillinger. You all right in there?"

Danny pushed past the man, whose nose wrinkled at the smell which hit them from the door. "Get behind me."

Dillinger's mouth dropped open when he saw that Danny had his gun out.

Danny cleared the living room and kitchen swiftly, making his way to the bedroom where the smell was stronger. A smell he knew well. A smell, that once it became a part of you, could never be fully scrubbed from the memory.

But she wasn't there either. "Montana? Montana, you here?"

_Please God. Please, dear God, let her be all right._

He pushed open the bathroom door and dropped to his knees as he fumbled for his phone and hit Dispatch. "I need a bus. Officer down." He snapped out Lindsay's address, as he reached out for the small body crumpled on the floor.

There was blood all over her legs, the toilet, the floor: blackened clots and streaks where she had fallen in it. Her blood-stiff clothes were stuck to her.

"Holy fuck. Holy shit, Lindsay. Honey, what did you do to yourself?"

The super peered around the door, and bolted for the kitchen, where he lost his comfortable illusions about nice girls along with his lunch.

"Go and show the EMTs where we are," Danny ordered, his voice icily calm, his shaking arms wrapped around Lindsay. He checked her pulse: it was weak and thready, but steady.

"Hold on, sweetheart. I'm here, Linds. Fucking hell. Oh God, darling, what did you do?"

When the EMTs showed up, they had to pry her out of his arms.


	3. Chapter 3

_Spoilers for "Child's Play" and "All in the Family". _

_Disclaimer: All characters belong to CBS and their creators at CSI:NY._

_A/N: I am awed by the response to this story. Thank you to all who are reviewing and reading. But I would never have had the courage to post it without the support and encouragement of marialisa and sallyjetson, so the biggest debt of gratitude is owned to them. _

* * *

Chapter 3

_And a beautiful child, with butterfly wings_

_Trips down to the edge of the water and sings_

"Mr. Messer?" She was young and pretty, pulling her surgical cap off short blonde hair and pushing the strands out of her eyes.

Danny pushed himself off the wall he had been leaning against, his phone clutched in his hand. "How is she?"

"Would you come and sit down over here? We should talk."

Nervously, he sat, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees, restlessly passing the phone from one hand to the other.

"Ms Monroe has you down as her primary contact number."

"We work together. And …we're … together. I'm her boyfriend." He had never said that before. It felt odd.

"You found her?"

He nodded, closing his eyes briefly. "Doctor, please. Is she going to be okay?"

"She's stable and in Recovery. She should wake up soon, but she'll be pretty groggy. We had to do a D&C to control the bleeding and to make sure the uterus was completely clear of all fetal matter."

Danny felt as if his body had been dipped in cold water. "I'm … I'm sorry? Fetal matter? D&C?"

The doctor looked at him sympathetically. "I'm very sorry, Mr. Messer. Ms Monroe had an incomplete miscarriage. That caused the bleeding – which may have caused her to lose consciousness due to lowered blood pressure. "

Danny dropped his head into his hands, and concentrated on breathing for a moment.

"Mr. Messer?"

"She was pregnant. Lindsay was pregnant?"

"Yes. You didn't know?"

He took his glasses off and squeezed the bridge of his nose. "No," he said hoarsely.

The doctor nodded. "She may not have even known yet, Mr. Messer. We estimate she might have been as little as 6 weeks along. Were you using birth control?"

"Huh? Oh – oh. Yeah. Yeah, of course." Danny took a deep breath again, "Well. Usually." The flush ran through his veins, pushing out the ice that had filled him a moment before.

"But Ms Monroe was not on the pill?" Although the words were said gently, he could see the doctor taking notes.

He shook his head. "Diaphragm. Condoms," he mumbled.

The doctor stood and touched him lightly on the shoulder. "She should be awake in a few minutes. You can go in and see her as soon as the nurse tells you. Mr. Messer?"

He looked up at her, eyes blind and lost.

"You're both young. Ms Monroe is healthy. There is no reason for you not to have children if you choose to."

He nodded, but didn't really hear her. The phone in his hand began to vibrate, and he automatically checked the number as he answered it.

"Danny, where the hell are you?"

"Stella. Lindsay …"

"What – oh, God, Danny, what happened?" It didn't take a detective to hear the panic and fear in the man's voice.

"She's in the hospital. God, Stella, there was so much blood …"

"She was attacked? Did you call it in? Danny – you aren't trying to deal with this alone, are you?"

"No. Not - not attacked. She had a ... she lost ... Stella, did you know Linds was pregnant?" He blurted it out, hating himself.

"Oh God. Danny, did Lindsay lose the baby?"

He closed his eyes and leaned against the wall. "The doctor thinks she was about six weeks. She might not even have known." He dropped his head back against the wall and stared at the ceiling. "Stella, I don't even know what to say to her."

"Mr. Messer? Ms Monroe is awake." The young nurse smiled and spun on her heel, expecting him to follow her.

"Stel. She's awake. I gotta go. Could you tell Mac? And maybe go to her place and find her some clothes to change into?"

"I'll take care of it. Tell Lindsay I'm on my way."

Reluctantly, Danny caught up with the nurse, who was waiting impatiently outside a door.

"She'll be groggy and tired. Don't talk for long."

Danny sidled in the door and took a deep breath before moving towards the bed. He looked down at the still figure in the cold white bed and felt the ice move in his veins again. She looked young and vulnerable, her pale face still against the pillow, her eyes closed against bruised cheeks. He pulled up a chair and reached for her hand. "Montana. I'm here."

Her eyes fluttered a moment, and her breath quickened, but otherwise she did not respond.

"You're going to be okay, the doctor said. Do you hear me, honey? You're going to be fine."

When she still didn't speak, he cleared his throat. "Shit, Linds, you nearly scared me to death. When I found you like that …" He shuddered. "I thought something terrible had happened."

She turned her head away, tears sliding under fragile eyelids.

"No. Linds, I didn't mean that. I mean … I know something terrible has happened, but … I didn't know, Lindsay. I'm so sorry I didn't know." He stroked her cheek, brushing away the tears he could see. "Lindsay?"

He cupped her face in his hand and with a smothered sob, she launched herself against him, burying her head in the crook of his neck and wrapping desperate arms around him. He rubbed her back soothingly, murmuring soft words of love and encouragement.

Finally, he felt her breathing begin to steady, and the sobs that had torn through her began to ease. He pushed her damp hair out of her face, and kissed her gently on the cheek and temple, tasting the salt on his lips.

"Danny. I'm sorry."

"What for, sweetheart? Everything's going to be okay. I promise it will." He tried to look into her eyes, but she had closed them again, and was lying against him, exhausted. Tenderly, he helped her lie down again, tucking the thin hospital blankets up around her shoulders.

"Go to sleep, Linds. We'll talk in the morning. Everything will look different in the morning."

He had been sitting by her bed for nearly an hour before Stella showed up with an overnight bag for Lindsay and a cup of coffee for Danny.

"How is she?"

He shrugged, swallowing a gulp of coffee before rubbing a hand wearily down his face. "She's been sleeping."

Stella put the bag down, and stood looking at the younger woman in the large bed. She always forgot how small Lindsay was; with all her usual energy, she seemed to take up a much larger space.

"I cleaned up the apartment," she said idly.

Danny smiled crookedly, "Thanks, Stella. I know she'll appreciate that."

Stella nodded. It had been bad, though not as bad as Danny in his panic had originally thought. At least no one would smell the blood any more. "I found some info from her health clinic; I thought you might need it. Paperwork will occur." She handed him a small pile of papers and pamphlets, which he took with a nod and dropped on the bedside table.

"Have they told you anything yet?"

He shook his head and tossed the now empty coffee cup in the wastebasket. "They come in, check her vitals, and leave. I think they're just waiting for her to wake up to kick her out home."

Stella looked at the exhausted man sitting beside the bed. "Danny. Why don't you go home and have a shower? I'll stay with Lindsay until you get back."

He started to shake his head again, but she stopped him gently. "Danny. You have blood on your clothes, on your hands. Go get cleaned up. Get something to eat. I'll be here when you get back."

"Don't let them release her."

She nodded, and took his place at the foot of Lindsay's bed. "Go home. Come back in a couple of hours."

She waited until he had left, then took Lindsay's hand in hers.

"Hey kiddo. He's gone."

Lindsay's eyes fluttered open, and held Stella's, full of guilt and misery.


	4. Chapter 4

_Spoilers for "Child's Play" and "All in the Family". _

_Disclaimer: All characters belong to CBS and their creators at CSI:NY._

_A/N: Again, thank you to all those who are reading and reviewing. I appreciate your trust in the story. _

* * *

Chapter 4

_And the lonely young wife, her heart beating wild,_

_Cries, 'Wait till I come – till I reach you, my child!' _

* * *

_A sympathetic nurse says, "Can I get you some water? Did you not expect this result?"_

_She shakes her head. No, she had not expected this result. Feared it. Hoped it. Wanted it not to be true. Prayed that it was true._

_She sips the water, her thoughts whirling behind a pale face._

"_Would you like to talk to a doctor? Do you need to discuss some options?"_

_Discuss her options. With a doctor. That was not the one she should be discussing this with._

_She nods her head. Get all the information, she thinks, desperately holding on to logic. Find out everything. Then you can decide. Then you'll know what to do. Don't take a leap.  
_

_The doctor is with her quickly. It is 2 o'clock in the morning; the waiting room had been nearly empty when she got here. She hears it filling up; the bars empty at 1:30 and the shift workers are coming in._

"_Were you using birth control? Trying to avoid getting pregnant?" _

_The doctor's voice is studiously neutral, and Lindsay wants to scream at her, "What kind of idiot do you think I am?"_

_Obviously the kind of idiot who forgets to protect herself against an unwanted pregnancy._

"_Does the father know? Are you in a relationship?" _

_She says "No" to the first question, and a hesitant "yes" to the second. She is in a relationship. Isn't she?_

"_Are you going to tell him?"_

_That one echoes so deep she feels it in the pit of her stomach. She mumbles, "It's not a good time."_

_The doctor has been asking the questions while examining her, and now helps her sit up, pulling the curtain so Lindsay can get dressed. "I can confirm the pregnancy – the cervix is closed. However, there is some evidence of bleeding. It may be nothing to worry about: it's quite common. You're very early on. Given your dates, only about 6 weeks. You still have time to make a decision."_

_That is good. At the moment Lindsay can't decide whether to put her underwear back on or not. The slippery gel the doctor used to do the internal exam feels invasive against her skin. It hurt. The exam hurt. Like someone inside is pinching her with hard, callous fingers. She glances down in the wastebasket. There is blood on the paper that had been under her._

"_If you do decide to terminate the pregnancy, you have until the end of the first trimester."_

_The doctor goes on to describe various procedures and choices she could make, but Lindsay thinks for a minute she has gone deaf._

"_Terminate. Terminate. Terminate."_

_It is all she can hear. It echoes in her gut with the previous question: "Tell him? Terminate. Tell him? Terminate." _

"_Ms Monroe?" The doctor lays a hand on her arm and Lindsay looks into her eyes._

_Deep blue eyes._

_That's when the tears start._

* * *

She didn't remember going home. She was pretty sure they had called her a cab. The cabbie was a woman, quiet and sympathetic. Lindsay had memorized the information on her cabbie license, the details of the clean back seat, the lyrics of the gentle folk music on the radio.

Anything but think. Anything but feel that pain still tangling its way through her stomach.

"How did I get here, Stel?" Her voice sounded rusty, unused, and Stella offered her some water before answering.

"Mac sent Danny to find you. You had collapsed in the bathroom."

"Why?"

Stella's eyes were bright with unshed tears. "You had a miscarriage, honey."

Lindsay's hands went automatically to her belly, lacing over it protectively. "No. I can feel it. My baby is fine. I didn't do anything to hurt my baby."

She began to cry and Stella rang for a nurse as she soothed and petted the young woman. "Of course you didn't. Hush, Linds. It's okay."

The nurse adjusted the IV that was attached to Lindsay's arm. "I added a mild tranquillizer to the saline. It will help keep her calm. The doctor is on her way."

"Linds. The doctor is going to come and talk to you. Just hold on a minute, okay?"

When the doctor came, she was brisk and professional. Words floated around Lindsay's head, "Nature's way … perfectly normal… one out of every three pregnancies ends in miscarriage … most times a woman doesn't even know … it simply means the fetus was not truly viable."

How was this supposed to make her feel better, Lindsay wondered bitterly.

"You are perfectly healthy," the doctor concluded her practiced speech. "There is no reason to believe you and your partner cannot conceive a child or that you cannot carry to term. You have nothing to worry about."

She smiled, a flash of perfect white teeth in a heart-shaped face surrounded by blonde curls.

Lindsay hated her.

"When can I go home?" she muttered.

The doctor cast a cool eye on the IV bag. "As soon as the bag is empty and you've voided, the nurse will take you off all the monitors. Then you are good to go. You'll need to make an appointment to see your own doctor in a week. You'll keep bleeding, like a regular but heavy period, for about that long. No intercourse for six weeks, no trying to get pregnant again for three months. Give your body time to heal. Come in right away if there is any severe pain or excessive bleeding, any fever or nausea."

She recited the facts and Lindsay felt every word as a pinprick. She was a CSI, she thought blindly. Shouldn't she know how many times the heart could be perforated before it emptied itself out?

Lindsay's hand was tightly wrapped in Stella's until the doctor left, and then Stella handed her a tissue to wipe her streaming eyes.

"Danny's coming back... he'll take you home." Stella winced as her hand was suddenly crushed and Lindsay shook her head.

"No. No. Would you just take me home Stel? Please. I don't want Danny. Not right now. Please? I just want to go home." Her eyes were wide and pleading, and Stella could hear the rising hysteria.

"Okay. Yes. Don't worry, Linds. I'll take you home. Just let me go call Danny and tell him not to come back. Look, here's the nurse. She's going to help you clean up."

Stella extricated herself and stepped down the hall, flipping open her phone and calling Mac first to report why now three of his CSIs were MIA.

"Tell Lindsay not to worry about anything. She's off until further notice. What about Danny?" Mac's voice was calm as always, but Stella didn't make the mistake of thinking it meant he didn't care.

"I sent him home to clean up. Lindsay doesn't want him to take her home, so I'm going to stay with her a little while. I'll call and let him know. I'll be back in as soon as I can, Mac."

"It's okay, I'll pressgang Adam and maybe Kendall from the lab if I need someone. Take care of Lindsay, and phone me later. I'll see you tomorrow."

Stella quickly phoned Danny, but the call went straight to voice-mail. "Look Danny, it's Stella. Stay home. I'll take Linds home and make sure she's okay for tonight. She just needs … a little time to process, I think. Call her tomorrow."

When Danny showed up an hour later, the room was empty, the bed was already stripped, and a young nurse was cleaning out the garbage containers.

"The young lady who was in here? Where is she?" His voice was a little harsher than it needed to be, and the nurse dropped the container she had in her hand.

"I'm sorry sir. She's been discharged." She knelt down to pick up the scattered papers and detritus from the floor, and apologetically, Danny did the same.

He grabbed the handful of pamphlets and papers Stella had brought from Lindsay's apartment, and glanced through them quickly to see if there was anything with personal information or anything Lindsay would need. Pamphlets on nutrition, on exercise, on pre-natal care – the kinds that sit on display units all over the city. His whole body stilled when he turned over one information sheet.

_**Warning:**_

_Both mifipristone and methotrexate can cause severe bleeding, which resembles a'natural miscarriage'. Excessive bleeding, faintness, or severe nausea may be signs of a potentially dangerous reaction, and women experiencing these symptoms must seek immediate medical attention._

"Sir? Are you all right?" The young nurse grabbed at his arm as he swayed.

"Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine. Thanks," Danny stuttered as he shoved the papers in his pocket and ran out the room.

It was time to talk to Lindsay.


	5. Chapter 5

_Spoilers for "Child's Play" and "All in the Family". _

_Disclaimer: All characters belong to CBS and their creators at CSI:NY._

_A/N: Thank so much to the people reading this story. I love reviews, of course, but I appreciate the people who are following along and letting me know by putting the story on alerts as well._

* * *

Chapter 5

_And the wife in her dreaming steps out on the stream,_

_But the lily leaves sink, and she wakes from her dream._

Stella had gone, and Lindsay was finally alone.

Alone except for the crying in her head. Alone except for a small shadow she could see out of the corner of her eye, a brief sense of presence, gone as soon as she turned her head.

"Dream lover" Jung had called it – that shadowy sense of a loved one who has died, usually standing just behind the mourner. Lindsay wondered what psychologists called it when a woman heard the crying of a baby who had been little more than a handful of wildly reproducing cells when it simply stopped.

_Crazy. I suspect they call it crazy._

She sat on the couch, wrapped in the afghan her grandmother had made from scraps of wool before she left for university. She rubbed her hand over the green of her father's sweater, the baby blue of a lacy shawl her mother still wore in the winter evenings, pinks, reds and oranges from the inevitable cardigans each child would receive come September with the return to school, worn on cool mornings and tossed into backpacks when running home on warm afternoons.

One square, the centre one, was all black. Both Lindsay and her cousin had gone through a gloomy period when they were teenagers. Gran had joked that her cataract problems all stemmed from the early 90s and punk rock.

Lindsay ran her finger idly over the red heart sewn into that square, with her grandmother's initials and the date. The tears welled up unbidden, and sternly, Lindsay bit her lip to keep them at bay.

"What is done cannot be undone." Gran's words to get through the day.

"Don't wear your heart on your sleeve."

"Never run after a bus or a man – another one will be along in 20 minutes."

Lindsay gave in. Heart's blood tears, her mother called them, the tears that come from the centre of one's being. And there was no stopping the flood.

She didn't hear the knocking on the door at first. When she did, she decided to ignore it. She didn't want to see anyone.

"Thanks again, Mr. Dillinger. No, everything is okay now. Yeah, I'll look after her." That unmistakable accent cut through her leaky heart like a scalpel.

She looked up as he walked into the small living room, his eyes on the floor, hands jammed deep into his jeans pockets.

"Why are you here?" Her voice felt as it had to come a long way just to be heard.

"Linds. We need to talk." He sat on the edge of a chair across the room from her, hands nervously entwined.

"Now you want to talk."

He looked up at that. "What do you mean?"

She heard the undercurrent of anger, but couldn't care.

"I've been trying to talk to you for days."

He stood up and moved restlessly to the window. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be."

It should have sounded forgiving. She wanted it to sound forgiving. But it sounded indifferent.

He turned to face her, hands dug deep in his pockets. "Rikki needed me, Linds. She lost her son, her only child."

Lindsay closed her eyes, hands clenched so tight in the afghan she could feel the strands of wool cutting into her fingers. "So did I."

Danny stilled, then slowly pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket and dropped it on the table in front of her.

"Did you?"

His voice, dead and cold, forced her eyes open. She glanced down at the paper, saw the words Post-Abortion Care, and went so white he took a step forward involuntarily.

She rose from the couch, the afghan clutched around her like a robe, eyes burning. "Get out."

Danny sighed and reached out a hand. "Lindsay."

She jerked away from him. "Don't touch me."

"Linds. I just need to know. Please, Lindsay. You owe me that." His voice was rising with frustration, with anger, with a nameless terror that was curling through his guts.

"I don't owe you a thing." A lash across the soul.

Danny turned to the window again, his hands helplessly clenching. "I have a right to know. It was my baby too." He shot a glance at her over his shoulder, and felt his heart freeze as she crumpled back onto the couch.

"No. It wasn't."

"What the hell are you talking about? Of course it was! I know you, Lindsay Monroe. There is no way in hell you were screwing around on me. If you were pregnant, I was the father. And you should have talked to me before you did this …" he gestured at the pamphlet on the table.

"It was mine. My baby. If it had lived… then, perhaps … it might have been yours. But now, right now, it was mine alone." Her voice had risen; she stopped and took a deep breath, trying to keep the hysteria at bay.

Then she looked at him with bitter mirth and attacked, "And talk to you?"

He flinched and stepped back from the fury in her eyes.

"When was I supposed to talk to you? When you flew into work late every day? When you left early so you didn't have to see me? When you let your phone go to voice mail every time I've called for the past week?"

He closed his eyes, scrubbing both hands over his face. "You … I … I wouldn't have let you down on this, Lindsay. I'd have stood by you."

_Not like Ruben. I wouldn't have failed my own kid. I wouldn't have failed you like I did Rikki._

The unspoken words hung between them on the silent air.

Finally Lindsay nodded, once, briskly, and spoke in an icy voice, "Fine. Do you want to hear it? I went to the clinic to find out if I was pregnant. The doctor said I was, but I was already bleeding. They gave me information – on everything, I think. I don't know. I was … not thinking very straight. By the time I got home, I was … cramping. Then the bleeding started. I don't know how long…" she was speaking in gasps now, and Danny dropped to a crouch in front of her, taking her cold hands in his.

"Linds. I'm sorry." He reached up a hand to push her hair back from her face.

Her hand snapped up to grab his wrist, pushing him away from her. "I wish you had just left me on the floor." It hissed out through her teeth, leaked out from behind closed eyes. "I wish you had just minded your own fucking business and left me alone. I wish you hadn't suddenly decided that I was worthy of your attention again."

She looked straight into his eyes then and said, clearly and loudly, "I wish you would just leave and never come back."

"I'm not leaving you, Lindsay." He tried to move his hand, but she was strong, stronger than her slight frame would indicate, and she succeeded in keeping him at arm's length.

"If you don't go, I'll phone the precinct and have you arrested." Her voice was now perfectly calm and rational.

"You don't mean it." He looked at her, a challenge in his eyes.

She stood and walked to the table where she had left her phone. She hit speed dial, "Don? I need your help. How soon can you get to my apartment?"

Danny stood, radiating shock and anger. "I'm going."

She dropped the phone and said coolly, "Don't come back."

He walked to the door, legs stiff, his whole body revolting against the direction he was taking. He stopped, one hand on the doorknob, the other against the door, and leaned hard for a moment. "Montana." It was hardly above a whisper.

"Don't." Her voice ghosted back. "Just don't. If you ever cared about me, go."

He pulled the door open and stepped through, closing it almost delicately behind him.

Once she was sure he was gone, Lindsay collapsed into a heap on the floor and let the tears come.


	6. Chapter 6

_Spoilers for "Child's Play" and "All in the Family". _

_Disclaimer: All characters belong to CBS and their creators at CSI:NY._

_A/N: Thank you as always to all the people who have reviewed. I appreciate the people reading and putting the story on alerts and favourites._

* * *

**Chapter 6**

_Ah, the waking is sad, for the tears that it brings,_

_And she knows 'tis her dead baby's spirit that sings._

"What the hell are you talking about?" Flack looked at his best friend, a man he trusted like no other, in shocked disbelief.

"She told me to go. So I went." Danny swallowed another bitter draught from his pint glass. "And that's it. What else do you want me to say?"

Flack moved closer, dropping his voice and getting into Danny's space.

"So the woman you spent a year mooning after, waited for, followed out to Montana, the one you've been with for six months, tells you to walk away after losing her baby – _your _baby, Messer – and you just walk away?"

Danny dug into his jacket pocket and dropped a small velvet box on the counter between the glasses. "It gets better," he said morosely.

It was Flack's turn to take a pull on his drink as he struggled to say something. Anything. The only thing coming to mind was a straight upper-cut to the jaw, and it seemed a little extreme.

But only a little.

"When were you going to ask her?"

"Couple weeks back. Before Ruben …" Danny had to clear his throat. Just saying the name choked him.

Flack nodded, and reached out to open the box. A sparkling solitaire diamond, perfectly traditional, not large, perhaps half a carat, in a white gold setting. He could see it on Lindsay's hand. "Pretty."

Danny nodded, finished his drink and signaled for another one as he closed up the box and stuck it back in his pocket.

"Why did you leave?"

Danny dragged an idle finger in the condensation on the side of his glass and thought for a minute.

Flack wondered if he realized he had just written LM.

"She threatened to call the cops. She called you."

After the phone call from Lindsay, it had taken Flack five minutes to think about it, and twenty minutes to get to their usual hangout and find Danny already draped at the bar.

Danny was hunched on the stool. "She looked so small. So scared. I don't want her to …" His voice went very quiet. "She was afraid of me, Don."

Flack stared into his glass. He hated himself for even opening his mouth. "She have a reason?" He felt his heart skip a beat and held his breath when Danny nodded somberly.

"I asked her if she'd had an abortion."

The breath released as if Flack had been punched in the stomach. "But she didn't. Didn't you talk to the doctor?"

Danny shrugged. "I know." He drank again.

"Then why ask that?" Flack's bullshit radar was on full quivering alert.

"We never talked about anything."

"Okay."

"We never talked about kids."

"So?"

"So the first thing she does when she finds out she might be pregnant with my kid is go talk to someone about _options."_Danny invested the word with a bitter twist.

Flack stared into his glass. "Messer, I hate to say this, but given the circumstances, it … kinda makes sense."

"What circumstances?" Danny swiveled to look at Flack, but Don was staring into his glass as if looking for the answers there.

"Well, with everything that's been going on. With … Ruben … with Rikki. Maybe, Linds just didn't think this was a good time. If you hadn't talked about it before, I mean." Flack writhed in agony. There were six other circles of hell he'd rather be experiencing right about now.

"So, you agree with her. I'm not good enough to look after a kid. Not even to bring one into the world." Danny's voice dripped venom, but under it, Flack could hear the paralyzing fear.

"No! Danny, that's not what I said. She never said that, either." Flack shook his head. He knew Lindsay would never have said anything that would wound Danny like that.

"She didn't have to." Danny slumped again. "She's right. Hell, I couldn't even keep one little kid safe in his own community, on his own damn streets. No wonder she doesn't trust me."

Flack finished his beer, and turned the glass in his hands. "You know, Messer," he said conversationally, "Sometimes you really make me sick."

Beer glass halfway to his mouth, Danny stopped and stared.

"You have a fucking saviour complex. Only happy if you are saving someone's ass. It makes you a good cop, aside from that whole following orders thing," Flack frowned down at his empty glass, and sighed, "But in some ways, it makes you a lousy friend."

Grimly, Danny signaled the bartender.

"No. We're leaving." Flack glared at the server, who had started to make his way back down to their end of the bar.

Flack tossed a couple of bills on the counter, raising his eyebrows in disbelief when the barman jabbed his thumb in the air, indicating the tab was higher than that. Flack rolled his eyes, but tossed another fiver on the pile and shook his head when the bartender started to protest.

"Come on, man," Flack put a strong arm under his friend's upper arm and heaved him off the stool. "We gotta get you out of here before your ass is permanently attached to that bar stool."

Danny suffered himself to be dragged out of the bar and tossed into Flack's car. He put his head back and closed his eyes as the car began to move.

The car stopped and he started to get out of the car, then glanced around. "What the fuck?" It came out on a weary sigh. "Look, Flack, I appreciate your interference in this. I know you are trying to be a friend. But if you're not going to take me home, I'll just get a cab."

Flack was looking as stubborn as he knew how, and it was a good look on him.

"You two need to talk."

Danny looked up at the window in Lindsay's apartment. A dim light shone through, even though it was nearly midnight.

"She doesn't wanna talk. Not to me."

"Then make her listen."

"How?"

"You're a pretty persistent guy, Messer." It was Flack's turn to put his head back and close his eyes. He had already put in a full shift with over time, and he wanted to go home and go to bed.

Danny was silent for a minute, then said, "Do you think she'll listen?"

"I think she'll kick your sorry ass from here to Montana and back again," Flack said shortly.

Danny snorted and shot Flack a sheepish look.

"And then, if you are very, very lucky, she'll accept that ring you have burning a hole in your pocket and someday, when it's right, there will be a whole mess of little Messers for me to harass," Flack said confidently. "But as long as you sit here wallowing in your past, you are going to completely miss out on a chance for your future."

Danny opened the car door again, and stepped out onto the pavement. Then he squatted down beside the car and looked Flack in the face. "Don't wait for me."

"You sure?"

"Yeah. One way or another. And Don?"

"Yeah?"

"Thanks, man."

"I'd say anytime, but I wouldn't mean it."

They grinned at each other tightly, and Danny bounded up the stairs of Lindsay's building two at a time.

Flack closed his eyes and settled in the car. He'd wait anyway.


	7. Chapter 7

_Spoilers for "Child's Play" and "All in the Family". _

_Disclaimer: All characters belong to CBS and their creators at CSI:NY._

_A/N: This is the final chapter. Thank you so much to all those who have read, reviewed and, I hope, enjoyed the story. I have been blown away by the incredible response._

_I may stay in this universe for a follow-up, so keep your eyes open!_

* * *

Chapter 7

'_Come, mamma! come! Quick! follow me!_

'_Step out on the leaves of the water-lily!'_

"Lindsay. Lindsay Monroe. I'm not leaving until you talk to me."

The voice sounded determined. Lindsay crept a little closer to the door, but could not muster up the energy to stand. She wrapped the afghan closer around her shivering body, as if she could hold the pieces of her heart together.

"Okay, Montana. Then I'll have to do all the talking. You can just listen."

She closed her eyes, and thought about putting her hands over her ears.

She heard a thump, and a slide, and when he spoke next, she realized he was sitting on the floor, his voice ghosting under the door.

"I watched Ruben grow up. When I moved into the apartment five years ago, he had just started school. Sometimes, when Rikki had to work, I'd walk him to school, or take him to the park. Not all the time, you know. Just every so often. I used to play catch with him in the park. I taught him how to ride a bike."

Lindsay crept closer, and curled beside the door, her hand flat against the place she thought his head would be.

"I don't want you to get the wrong idea, Montana. I wasn't the kid's surrogate dad or anything. I was just a guy in the neighbourhood. Sometimes, a kid needs a guy around."

There was a long pause, and Lindsay held her breath.

"I told him about the Blessing of the Bikes, Linds. Rikki, his mom, she wouldn't let him ride around the neighbourhood. And he was mad – said he wasn't a little kid any more. And I told him the church was blessing bikes, 'cause people wanted to feel protected, you know?"

Another long pause, and this time Lindsay knew he was crying. Her arms ached to hold him, but she didn't move.

"I blamed myself for putting him on the street, for not keeping him out of danger. And then I blamed myself for not reading Rikki better, for letting her get the drop on me, take my gun. I spent all day thinking – what if she kills someone? Kills herself? With my gun?"

The voice, which had been rising with emotion, became suddenly hushed. "But if I had known… if I'd had a clue … that you needed me … that you were in trouble … Lindsay, I'd have dropped everything. I'd have been there for you."

Tears were running down her face again. Her heart beat heavy under their weight.

"I stepped back and waited for you last time. I came out to Montana when I couldn't stand it anymore, letting you go through something like that all on your own. And if I stepped out this time, left you to face things alone, Lindsay, you have to know I didn't mean to. I love you. And I don't want to leave you to face anything alone again."

There was a fumbling at the door, and Lindsay held her breath as something was pushed under the door. A small, sparkling something that came out just near her hand.

"I was going to ask you two weeks ago. Remember? It was supposed to be a nice dinner out, and then we got called in to that double homicide and dinner was cold pizza at five in the morning over a gas chromatograph."

She heard him suck in a painful laugh, as she reached out a hand for the ring lying beside her.

"I should have just done it anyway, given you the ring and the speech and everything in the middle of the lab. I wonder what you would have said?" The husky voice stopped a minute. Then it continued softly, "I bet I know."

"_Spoken like a true romantic_." She whispered the words under her breath, just as he said them on the other side of the door. A shaky smile fleeted over her face.

"I love you, Lindsay. I want to marry you. I want to have little girls with your brown eyes and little boys who can play ball with me. I want Flack to be their guy in the neighbourhood who gets them out of trouble. And sometimes into it. I want Stella to spoil them and teach them pickup lines in Greek and show them how to strip down a semi-automatic."

His voice had gone dreamy, and Lindsay was sitting cross-legged on the floor, staring at the ring in her hand.

Staring at the promise in her hand.

"It won't always be easy. You know that. I know that. And I'm scared to death that it will go wrong. But I want life to be complicated and messy with you."

Still staring at the ring in her hand, Lindsay reached up and unlocked the door.

"Linds?"

The door pushed open a little way, and Danny and Lindsay were face to face, seated on the floor, one on either side of the door.

She held his ring out to him, her hand trembling.

Everything in him seemed to freeze as he took the ring from her. "Isn't there any way I can change your mind? Anything I can say?" Blue eyes looked into hers, misery bubbling in the depths.

She looked at him. "You could try asking me."

A tiny ray of hope mingled with the grief. "Lindsay Monroe, will you marry me?"

"It doesn't change anything. You screwed up, Danny."

"I know."

"You shut me out."

"I know."

"I thought we weren't going to do that any more."

"I know."

"I wanted to be there for you, and you wouldn't let me."

"I know."

"I wanted to tell you," she whispered, tears beginning to fall.

He reached for her through the door, sliding closer. "I know," he whispered back.

"You should have been there." The sob shook her body.

He pulled her into his lap, hands rubbing her back soothingly. "I know."

The sobs came tearing through, and Danny wrapped his arms around a grieving mother for the second time that week.

But this woman was his, and he would never let her go.

Finally, she lay in his arms, wrung out and emptied.

He reached for her hand, and put the ring on her finger. "Marry me."

She looked at it for a long time.

Finally, she kissed him and nodded.

He kissed her back, sealing the promise.

They sat there, in the hall, silent, until finally Danny said, "Uh, Montana?"

She lifted her head from his shoulder. "Uh-huh?"

"Do you think we could get out of the hall now?"

She struggled to her feet, and reached down to pull him up. He pushed himself up against the wall, not using her help.

She looked at him, then at her rejected hand, confused and troubled.

"No lifting," he informed her quietly. "No lifting anything heavier than a teacup for six weeks."

She flushed hotly, her hand going automatically to cover her stomach.

He stepped over the threshold and reached out a hand. "We'll take our time, Montana. Recovery isn't fast or easy. But we'll do it together. A step at a time."

'_Come, mamma! come! Quick! follow me!_

_Step out on the leaves of the water-lily!'_


End file.
